HOPE DEFERRED
Once there was a woman whose harmless madness was to believe herself to be a bride, and on the eve of her wedding. Waking up in the morning, she asked for a white dress, and a bride’s crown; smiling, she adorned herself. “To-day he will come,” she said. In the evening sadness overmastered her, after the idle waiting; she then took off her white dress. But the following morning, with the dawn, her confidence returned. “It is for to-day,” she said. And her life passed in this tenacious, altho ever-deceiving, certitude—taking off her gown of hope, only to put it on again. (Text.)
(1442)
HOPE ENERGIZES
Hope is energy. The provisions have failed; the boat leaks, the seas rise, strength is gone, and intolerable thirst alone remains. But, upon the horizon there rise the masts and then the hull of the liner. Hope at once energizes. With the vestige of remaining strength, the distress signal is hoisted, it is seen; it is answered, the steamer’s course is changed, and rescue is at hand.—John E. Adams.
(1443)
Hope, Imparting—See [Sick, Mirror an Aid to the].
Hope Revived—See [Extremity not Final].
HOPELESS FEAR
Is there not an Eastern apologue which tells how the Angel of Pestilence was questioned as to the ten thousand victims he had slain? And did he not answer, “Nay, Lord, I took but a thousand; the rest were slain by my friend Panic.” How many, too, have sunk into the deep waters of the black river and been floated on to the ocean of eternity, for very paralysis of hope when the evil hour was upon them and they had just wetted their feet on the brink! They could, and they would have stept back to the solid shore; but they had no courage for the attempt, no energy to strike out to the land. The waters closed over their bowed head, and they sobbed away their breath in the very supineness of terror, the very lethargy of hopeless fear. Death is like everything else—a foe to be fought, a wild beast to be kept at bay. They who contend with most spirit live the greater number of days. The will to live and the determination not to die make the most efficacious antidote against the poison of the “lethal dart.” The hopelessness of fear is that poison itself.—E. Lynn Linton—The Forum.